Obama orders DOD, DOJ, and Homeland Security to research smart guns

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On Tuesday, President Barack Obama outlined a series of steps intended to reduce gun violence in America. In the three years since Sandy Hook, Congress has repeatedly deadlocked on the issue. Obama’s proposed changes fall far short of what was proposed in the legislature, and is generally limited to clarifying and enforcing existing law — with one exception.

First, let’s overview the changes. Obama intends to close the background check loophole that allows online sales and gun show sales to proceed without requiring a background check, as well as to overhaul the background check system used by the FBI. The current system has proven woefully inadequate at preventing shooters with documented mental health problems from buying firearms; The New York Times reports that the shooters in eight of the past 15 mass shootings had documented mental health issues that did not appear on background checks.

Improving and overhauling background checks takes additional manpower. As part of this initiative, Obama wants to hire an additional 200 agents for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. He also called for a reduction in the barriers that keep important information about mental health isolated between states, and promised an additional $500 million in federal funding for treatment of mental health issues.

Finally — and this is new — Obama ordered the DOD, DOJ, and Homeland Security “to conduct or sponsor research into gun safety technology” that would cut down on the number of negligent, accidental, and unauthorized discharges of firearms in the United States.

Can better tech create safer weapons?

Let’s take a closer look at this last point. A so-called “smart gun” is a firearm that includes an authentication system that only fires when its owner (or another, authorized user) allows it to do so. The concept dates back decades — one system, Magna-Trigger, first came to market in 1975 and is still sold today. Magna-Trigger only works with a handful of revolvers, but places a magnet inside the weapon that prevents it from being fired unless the operator is wearing a matching ring. Most publications cite it as the only “smart” technology that ever shipped.

In theory, the field should be wide open for better, more flexible alternatives. There are a number of easy, low-range networking options that can be used to link a firearm to an authentication token, fingerprint scanners are cheap, and RFID is an established technology. A quick survey of the market shows a number of devices are in development, including projects that rely on all these methods. Some companies are even working on systems that could be retrofitted to existing hardware, thereby addressing the concerns of gun owners who might genuinely prefer such options but don’t want to buy expensive new firearms.

What’s less clear is whether or not these systems can be made sufficiently flexible and affordable to interest gun owners. None of the “smart” weapons we’ve seen in-market to-date have been inexpensive — certainly not as inexpensive as a gun safe and reliable lock. Unless the government wants to wait decades for smart gun technology to make a difference in accidental shooting rates, owners need kits that can be easily retrofitted to existing devices without compromising their functionality — and these kits need to be extremely secure, while remaining easy to configure. Any designer of a smart gun kit has to allow for the fact that some users will rely on the fact that the weapon is supposedly secure, and will therefore be more prone to leaving a firearm lying about than they might be otherwise.

The Armatix iP1

To date, the handful of solutions on the market, like the Armatix iP1, have not reviewed particularly well, although the only significant review appears to have been written by a publication of the NRA, which opposes smart guns on principle. It’s true that the United States government, as the largest purchaser of firearms in the US, could spur new innovation and research on safety technologies. But firearms are generally valued because they offer simple, straightforward operation.

The DOJ, DOD, and FBI have been ordered to submit reports by April that detail the real-world deployment of smart gun technologies, according to the Army Times, and presumably include recommendations on which of the various authentication technologies to back. This will be a long-term project if anything comes of it. But we’ll be curious to see if the concerted backing of the US government can spur gun manufacturers to field results more practical than what we’ve seen to-date.

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